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Author
Topic: Crystal Meth (Read 13455 times)

"In my own safe little womb-world I was unaware meth use is still a big problem, and that scares me because of my ignorance but mostly because meth (as opposed to prescription amphetamines) has been in use since the 80s (at least) and it's always been bad news. I mean, how long ago did Peter place his posters in NYC? At least a year." quote Boo...................................I'm putting this topic up so that people who have been posting on Tims thread about the loss of his two friends dont have to fill that thread with questions and comments about meth.Annecdotally, crystal meth is huge in the gay community right now. I am not sure why. Is it the cost...ie cheap. The availability.... the what? Anyway, friend of mine was at the baths here not long ago for a party and was dressed in a cops uniform...state trooper actually ..... and he went looking around the bathhouse at the guys there. His comment was: " I guess they thought I was the real thing because eveyone was trying to hide his meth from me."

It's really, really huge with people who want to get lost in the world of sex. It's tailor made for the bathhouse, sex club, peep show booth queen world. Club kids are into it too though, more because the high goes a long way. You just need a little bit to get high, unlike coke that you need to keep doing lines of. Hence it is safer in terms of getting caught by security in a club. Smaller portions, easier to hide. Lots of reasons all rolled into one really.

I saw all of this coming in a big way around '98. All of my friends were doing it in clubs. I was the only one who rarely dabbled in it because I just don't like being speedy rodriguez. One of my best friends got hooked on it really early around then, he got kicked out of his house and silly me, I took him in and then couldn't get rid of him. He was disappearing for days, hooking up via phone sex lines, guys would pay for him to get high so they could screw him (cute brazilian... you know). I finally had to sit him down one day and say "Look queen... you are big mess. You scream at the top of your lungs in your sleep. You need to fix this and fix it quick or your life will be ruined." He finally moved out into a new relationship with someone who dealt coke. Great move. Within a year they broke up and he went into Narcotics Anonymous... he might have done an out patient detox first I can't remember. I'm sure he had a couple relapses but he's been clean now for five years. Got a scholarship at the School of Visual Arts and graduates in May. He's around 37 and has been HIV+ for about a decade. He got infected by his meth addicted French Canadian boyfriend at the time, the guy also was who I'm quite sure introduced him to meth, or at least huge quantities of it... and orgies.

Meth scares me. I have yet to meet a meth user who was not batshit crazy - sometimes in the most subtle, yet chilling ways.

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"Many people, especially in the gay community, turn to oral sex as a safer alternative in the age of AIDS. And with HIV rates rising, people need to remember that oral sex is safer sex. It's a reasonable alternative."

Hmmmmmm, so Philly, it can be done outside the club and not witnessed. Does this mean that the clubs have cracked down on drug dealing and use inside the clubs?? I mean.... I remember a lot of dealing and use inside clubs in the 80's. So that doesnt go on anymore?I guess the hip hop clubs here where all those shootings take place must have a lot of crystal meth use going on. Cause I know they are too scary for me. What about celebs...like Britney...are they doing meth too? I read she is in rehab.

Oh yes. In NYC they did major crackdowns starting around '99-'00, and they always periodically flare up. But it got noticeably more strict around that time... well, until they found a dead body in a storage room at Twilo and shut the club down for good.

Now for every addict I know an equal or greater number of what I'd call "dabblers" that know their limits and don't develop substance abuse issues. But I do find meth to be of a particular unsavory stew as I described. Put it this way, it's no little pill of ecstasy. She demands entire weekends... I remember queens running up to me and exclaiming "I've been up 3 days!" all excited and all I could say to myself is "Yeah, and you look a mess"

It's really widely used in sex clubs and with on line hook ups. Everywhere.

Britney, it's possible isn't it? I had someone tell me once that Ellen used their dealer in Miami. Gee... I know some odd folks.

In the mid 1980's it was bad in Dallas. It took a while for it to catch on here. But it's epidemic proportion here because it's so easy to make. NH3 can be found at any fertilizer plant or in the tanks on farmer's property. They bust up manufactures left and right here. It was my drug of choice at one time and the thought of how addicting it is scares me to death that I was stupid enough to try it. First is was 1/2 a 1/4 a day, then I was up to a gram a day before I was dragged to a rehab center. It's nothing to mess with.

I never did more than one night out in a club a few times a year, and that was only for a period of a couple years. Once I saw what was going on it made even less appealing than it already was. I just don't "get" the high. I think I just don't like things that make my heart race... it's not a relaxing high if that makes sense.

People with ADD love it. I guess if it had made me horny I might have done it more, but it really didn't make me very horny. It was all around me though all the time, obviously. I went out to clubs a lot and even was a DJ/remixer's manager for a while and I was quite sure even he was doing it.

then there are people like my friend who has been doing it for ten years. he is fucked up, crazy, flaky and iresponsible but somehow manages to keep his full time job as a casino black jack dealer and somehow manages to pass all his blood tests. he says that he does it by staying up 3 days in a row and sleeping like 2 days in a row.

he introduced it to me about 5 years ago and i sort of went bizurk on it for about a month. felt so good and i looked really good then, partied all night 4 days a week and etc... then i sorta got hooked up with a meth dealer who supplied me with all day long meth. i never really had full on intercourse with him, but supposedly he is dying of aids right now somewhere in hiding (he is being wanted by the law authority as well as many people). so if i did get hiv from him, i guess i have crystal meth to blame and my stupid self. but the interesting thing was, i did not feel that i was invincible when i was high, i was still extremely cautious of having protection and etc... also, being on meth makes you constantly feel like you have to go shit, so really, sex was the last thing on my mind, it was mostly about music and dancing and staying up all night and having the energy to do it.

What I love about meth heads is the look in their eyes which one generally sees in the eyes of serial killers.

They have this glint that says, "Look at me! I'm fuckin' crazy!"

I swear, a couple weeks ago I was gonna hook up with this dude that was was a self-admitted meth head... and we got to his house... and he looked into my eyes, and all I saw was John Fuckin' Wayne Gacy.

Every instinct in my body screamed, "The crazy meth head is gonna chop you into bits, fuck the bits, and then eat them!"

I seriously ran out of that house.

It was 4 AM.

And about 5 degrees outside.

I had to walk home three miles.

But alive.

That experience, in combination with the other times I've hung out with tweakers (who really are the most insufferable people to get along with) has led to the creation of my "if you do meth, get the fuck away from me" rule.

The rotting teeth help me to remember that maxim.

Benj(Who recognizes that when dealing with addicts, you're dealing with the drug and not the person... which is why he still hangs out with junkies.)

My boyfriend of 10 years started out with a speed habit that turned to meth when it bacame readily available down here in the mid-late 90's. It was a nightmare. He was psychotic. While I liked to party in those days, I couldn't wiat to get home and get stoned. I think being in a permanent pot haze helped me cope with endless days and nights alone, while he was up off somewhere. It was the end of us.

He's been totally clean for about 4 years now, and has got his life back. Thankfully.

Edited to add: From what I understand, and for the reasons Philly set out, it is very popular out here now. You have the added problem in Sydney these days of police with sniffer dogs walking the inner city streets and popping into any pub/club/venue they feel like. After the 2000 Olympics, they had all these additional sniffer dogs that they have put to use harrassing people in the inner city.

I was just at my favorite pizza joint in Hillcrest (gay part of san diego) and saw these two young club kids tweaking their head of on the street in the middle of the day, walking around,,, their clothes all dirty, skinny as stick, and pimples on their face out of control, it was really sad.... i kept thinking,,, jesus, that could have been me, easily! although i adore meth for the confidence that it gives me when i am out and about, i hate what it did to me and the tweakers that i have seen around.... burrrrr

I'm one of the ones that doesn't know what it is actually and has never seen anyone on it. But it has even surfaced here in my little town. I think they busted about 3 meth labs last summer. I use to dabble with coke, ventured into crack but not for long, and even has done acid which I must admit I loved. Never had a bad trip either but I wouldn't even venture into it again in this day and age. But I will always love Mary Jane....

I lost a brother to meth. It's bad bad stuff.I tried it twice, in the space of two weeks, back around the time I first seroconverted. (can we say "self medicating", boys and girls, I think you can).

It was so fun that I found myself wishing I could get it again. A lot. I stopped what I was doing and thought, "wow, if I want it this bad after two times, I can't imagine what it's like after twenty, or a hundred."

I never did it again. It's attraction was that scary.

Besides, I really prefer the mellow high of MJ.

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Floating through the void in the caress of two giant pink lobsters named Esmerelda and Keith.

I am naturally speedy, and like Philly said, " I just don't like things that make my heart race", as they usually just incite my TMJ. If I'm after a drug-induced buzz, I'm more likely to look at painkillers, sedatives, etc. And even that is now exceptionally rare.

I was totally naive to the enormous meth use and "partybois" until last March-April, when everything hit the fan with a bf I was very much involved with, but who hid his use (and behavior while using) from me. To say that I was devestated is an understatement. It was in attempting to understand the mechanics of meth use (and its sexual effects on users) that I started hooking up through Manhunt.net. It is safe to say that, of the many score men with whom I dallied, easily 90% were on meth and/or GHB. I learned very quickly how such drugs lower inhibitions.

I met men who were capable of extraordinary acts, but only when intoxicated. The first time someone sparked up the glass pipe, I was horrified. But by the time I met guys who'd excuse themselves to the bathroom for another boot, my attitude had changed entirely. I went from voyeur to passive co-participant. That is not to say that I ever tried it myself: I never did. But I understood that a dose was required in order for many guys to reach that next level, a level that I profited from on a sexual level.

Note that these guys would have found another guy to play with had it not been me. But many were the times when I heard someone say that I was the only guy they knew who didn't party but who could keep up and raise the stakes. I didn't need to drug in order to feel the effects, because the energy and disregard of anything approaching "limits" I felt in their presence pushed me careening on as well.

And I'm sure that the depression and void I felt when I pulled away was on the par with meth withdrawal. never underestimate the power of a co-dependant contact buzz. I saw guys go frigging wild, but never felt really threatened, and certainly never felt the need to walk out (or, as I am more likely to host) kick them out. I had what they needed, and they provided what I needed. It all felt very reciprocal.

It's difficult for me not to rthink of what happened to me as some sort of anthropological internship into another world, but essentially that's what it was.

Brent(Who has thoiught this through in some detail)

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Blessed with brains, talent and gorgeous tits.

The revolutionary smart set reads The Spin Cycle at least once every day.

Thank you for your honesty. One of the traits of an addict is that they are fundamentally incapable of being honest with themselves.

Often times, I've seen people inactively participate in the addictions of others for their own selfish gain. Often, these people are as sick as the addict - because they sexually prey on the people who are addicted without concern for the general welfare of the addict getting them off. Twacking them out of their tree with large doses of various, unsafe drugs.

I was fortunate. I've never had to endure the refuse of the lifestyle of a hard-core addict. I've never had an addictive personality. Sure, when I'm mad, I flush random things down the toilet to feel better about the world around me - but those are other issues entirely, and I digress.

I attend AA and NA meetings on a regular basis - not because I feel that I have a drug problem, but because I get to meet and know people who are in the solutions rather than toiling in the problems. The twelve step principals, regardless of addiction - be it sexual, drug, spending, eating - are a good set of principals by which to operate one's life. Rigorous honesty with ones self is an amazing thing to experience in action.

I will confess, though, for the brief period (about 4 months - and only on the weekends) I have used methamphetamines, I found long term lasting effects that I'm still recovering from to this day. I find that I have difficulty sequencing, remembering simple words, and my short-term memory has gone to hell. (These problems cause me difficulty with day-to-day work functions.) Fortunately, I can use memory aids and devices to function around these things, until my brain relearns what I've carelessly surrendered for the sake of unnatural, unglued monkey sex.

Meth is a terrible drug. I've seen it ruin countless lives. It almost KILLED my sister (but she died a year and a half ago anyway), and caused her undue unhappiness for a great percentage of her short life. The sad reality is that an addict can only get help at their own desire, which makes this drug such a tragedy because the nature of recovery forces many people to bear direct witness to the havoc and destruction of those we love.

I have no shame, and - ultimately - realize that I am the sum of my experiences (as we all are, respectively), both dynamic and new helping me to experience humility, forgiveness, compassion and the rest of life, on life's terms.

I pass NO judgement - except on Philly - who's still (with the utmost love and respect) an asshole. I love you philly. You're still one hot motherfucker!

Basquo, I hung out at JR's, Throckmorton Mining Company, Frathouse, and the other two that were on each side of JR's. I don't remember a Ron. Basquo, do you remember when two bar tenders and a bar back where shot leaving JR's in a robbery attempt?

Strayboy, you made me want to go into the kitch and make a glass of milk, just so it could shoot out of my nose

Funny

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"Many people, especially in the gay community, turn to oral sex as a safer alternative in the age of AIDS. And with HIV rates rising, people need to remember that oral sex is safer sex. It's a reasonable alternative."

Black beauties was the onlly other drug, before meth. I tried coke during my addiction time with meth and I thought it was a waste of money, when the meth lasted longer and was cheaper.

Oh God! remember those black mollies? ZOOM....ZOOM....ZOOMMETH: Had an on-again/off-again love affair with crystal in the 80's too. Lasted a decade till I got bored and "over it" with slow suicide. Did diagnosis to HIV discourage use? Hell no, it fueled it for another few years. It was a rather lenghty, self-destructive pity party. Did I stop when I overheard a little girl ask her mom, "Mommy, does that man have AIDS?" Yeap, I looked as bad as last stages of a grave illness. (I hadn't been diagnosed yet at that point.)Nope, I didn't cease and desist at that point either. Earlier this morning (4 am ) I composed a couple of paragraphs about my experience but it took so long for me to type it out that my session ended and was logged out the forum. When I hit the "Post" button it was all gone to internet netherland. In frustration, I'm not ready to redo it. It was kind of tiring just to recall those roller-coaster days.Starts with EUPHORIC; ends with HELL. What is it? Answer: Meth.

EDITED TO ADD: When I decided enough was enough there was no outside intervention. No support groups. I would have none of that. I was too embarassed and ashamed of what I did to myself. Solo intervention because it was me alone that brought this on myself. I don't blame dealers, I don't blame the codependents nor any other human being. Not at any point through it all. I entered into that hellhole lifestyle with eyes wide open. Now, I hate to add an element of fault to your theories fellas, but I did not lie to myself or anyone else through the whole stop-and-go indulgent 80's. I didn't steal either. Ever.

In the mid 90's I learned all about what speeds and crystal are capable of changing a person into. For me it was a fairly brief encounter which I do not regret, a matter of fact I learned a lot about myself. I learned that me on any synthetic drug always ends about 2-3 days after it started in a great depression and a disaster that is preprogrammed.

Here in Berlin there is a lot of speed being usedin the clubs but thank God crystal Meth has not established itself well here in the gay community. Don't get me wrong speed is bad, but crystal can be a devastating element when mixed in an already extream subculture.

One thing I will add, for those that don't understand the nature of Crystal and that was why Bear60 began this thread is this: Of all the drugs out there, or at least of the major ones used there are two really addictive ones: methamphetamine and heroin. These two drugs are really demonic evil twins, though not fraternal. They are indeed flip sides of one coin. One is an extreme upper, the other an extreme downer. If you get hooked on either, you will be going down a really bad, desperate road of addiction and will either die, or at least ruin 5 or more years of your life before you hit bottom and end up in rehab and a lifetime of Narcotics Anonymous meetings. At least that's what I've surmised.

This is why, when I dispense advice on drug use (advise that I realize many disagree with), I really try to separate these two drugs out from the rest. They are, put simply, completely different. The only reason I'm saying this, it's for the drug naive, that if you have a friend doing these two specific drugs they are the ones to worry about.

There really is nothing worse than watching a close friend slide into addiction. I failed twice in preventing two best friends from doing it, then seeing them attempt to hide it all from me, then giving up on dispensing advice to them because at some point you give up and let their addiction run it's course. I always refused to be The Enabler, and as a result their addiction properly wrecked our friendships. Oh, we're still friends in that we see each other a couple of times a year, but we are no longer what I would call "best friends." And once they bottom up, kick the habit, and start the NA meetings, Narcotics Anonymous becomes the drug substitute, and their almost daily meetings the new addiction. Of course, by that time you are just happy they are off the drugs, but it's always been a pattern that once they enter NA their life is so thoroughly changed that they only seem capable of hanging out with their new NA friends, which I can kind of understand.

Philly, I have to say Steve Kelso was my imaginary boyfriend for some time.

Because I work in mental health I see how drugs and alcohol ruin people's lives every time I go to work. In Greensboro we have some meth and heroin but crack is definitely the biggest drug around here. People lose everything because of their crack addiction and end up in the ER looking for help. We have women who prostitute not only themselves but their young children for crack. It's one reason why I just hate drugs.

I've been tossing and turning in bed all night, despite my most deserved attempt at sleeping. If you are frightened or offended by human emotion, and/or graphic description of behaviors and refuse; or if you find yourself having strong desire to not to take adventures in vocabulary beyond the terrifyingly limiting boundaries of the sixth grade reading level -saddly succumbing and settling wholeheartedly into the mediocrity and safety, of the sadly, but undoubtedly more familiar and less complicated conformation of our self wardened, underachieiving prison of language, we find ourselves so tacitly accepting to the detriment of our own enrichment - read no further.

It occurred to me that I needed to experience a catharsis in writing, as I found myself troubled by the judgement of those who never tried an illegal substance, and who didn't comprehend the sinew and continued allure of the experience. I want to attempt to express the intrinsic and torturous emotional hunger of methamphetamines that sickeningly permeates the curious soul, all the while inviting the universal laws of existence to rip you apart by the smallest and most unknowing particles seeking to help your spirit navigate all the gifts of sensation in our clumsy and seemingly unpurposeful and terribly arrogant attempts at working within the vessels we now find ourselves.

I Do ask that you please bear with my clumsy and desperate attempts at capturing it within the terribly confining and limiting restrictions of the English language. First and Formost, I submit this innate immutable truth I ask you to accept beyond the conceptual ideas of existence and, perhaps of the universe itself: Even given the abilities to impose any created sick and unnatural wills it may devise beyond the dimensional intent of time itself It will forever remain cursed with the unfortunate inability of mastering a solvent, collective understing through languages such a hunger of creational wholeness that my body spiritually and contortionally willed itself to attempt. If this requires you to briefly suspend your beliefs in order to accept the urgency and utopia of feeling I am attempting to convey - please do. In fact, I truly feel overwhelmingly crippled by my most proficient abilities of reason to relay the sagacity; I will pine forever within my very being for this feeling to embrace me again until the tides of creation wipe clean all that will ever be known. And for this reason, I'm intentionally using my complicated, and clumsy, and many strange yet liberating words so that they can own themselves yet yearn in despair- in my ultimate hope that they might personify the sensual embodiment and the sadness of knowing nobody will ever adequately be able to share my my appallingly delicious yet longingly and forever empty appreciation of this experience. I wish there existed such needed words.

Buckle Up.

Methamphetamines when I used them in conjunction with a fresh, and completely relaxing bottle of poppers enraged and woke a yieldless and otherworldly invitation and indescribably simple yet elusive hunger to be filled with the most turgidly destructive and willfully primal cock I could find - sometimes two at the same time, and, then, of course there was one sadly disappointing psychotic attempt at three. In fact, in this condition, I never even attempted to come close to achieving even the most remote in feelings of satisfaction unless I was unable to walk from my olypic ability to splay beyond comprehension and remain perfectly still and receptive and a long and memorable internal damage which allowed me to romanticize being fucked like I was owned for many days later - Unfortunately, I always felt unfairly limited by my my very real limits to the resilience and capacity of my body to accommodate partners with equipment physicalities of monsterous and unsatisfyingly destructive proportions resulting in wreckless and indifferent attempts to find the bottom of my hunger... just once.

I accommodated physicalities of colossal proportions desiring the most minimal of viscosity, and I was always guaranteed to withstand the most unrelentingly rageful and titanic force fucks, all the while ensuring that my taker never left the greed driven pulsing and masticating action of my body's overwhelming yet obsessive desire for my taker to disappear from existence into me, oven hoping with each unsurrendered pump to be taken with such destructive and painful force that all that I would split into several satisfied pieces that indepentendly would realize that they have been claimed. Oh, how it made me desire to be ridden to schrapnel. Often, I selfishly and aggressively indulged in the satisfaction of ushering the often unsurrendered, premature but pleasurably taken funk and exhaustion of another person deep into my perpetual emptiness *editors note - when I voraciously claim their exhaustion against their will (despite any unnoteworthy wimpering or feably unsuccessfull attepts at withholding orgasm) I allow them repose for the next episode - whether it be in 10 minutes or later that afternoon; however, If I've damaged them (I almost ripped off a testicle once armed with nothing except an inability to find shame and a craving in my attempt at finding the most lewd and nasty fuck known to humanity - of course this was an isolated incident where my hunger became disconnected from my self will and my hunger sent my ass into overdrive, seemingly into some undoubtedly homocidal agenda of ferocious fucking autonomous of my sanity) or if I've rendered them into a trembling mass of flesh temporarily worthless to their own senses for a longer period, I dutifully and obsessively seek another to rob of his primal urges until ultimately I succumb to the promise of being eventually delivered -unprepared and without self-compassion to the most terrible part of methamphetamines- to the unforgiving crash. The first time, I slammed methamphetamine, I was left unexpectedly in a place of helplessness, despair, pain, and fear, without warning, and without a point of reference and an overwhelming inability to realize, remember, or contemplate such a concept of happiness. I was temporarily lost into the deepest recesses of darkness my mind could conceivably fathom. I found myself constantly crying, fortunately those more experienced assured me and promised me repeatedly that eventually it would end, and I would be in a better world. However, I did like slamming. It was the most intense of the ways I had used it. After registering the needle, and releasing the tourniquet (I ardently resarched proper and sanitary protocols in doing this before doing it - to make sure I didn't fuck up my life even more.) Anyay, being the problemsolver I am, and wanting to slam a couple more times, I began to systematically research the science required to circumvent the cataclysmic chemical depression which slowly and systematically, despite my very successful and completely minimizing the depression to a joyously acceptable level, began eroding my self-esteem and inviting me to adopt a diseased and unhealthy way of living, where I began to distorting and then justifying behaviors and actions that allowed me to become toxic to those around me and unknowingly caustic to myself (Sadly, and painfully this was overwhelmingly evident to those around me). Though, regardless of the preventative crashing measures I take, to some degree I always have them - usually minimal and amazingly tolerable, as the result of the multitudes of Vitamins - particularly the 'B' complexes which arrest the free radicals in the bloodstream - turkey - for the triptophen that will allow my body and brain to make quality use of the actual sleep that it manages when I crash and my body fervently and exhaustedly removes toxins in its scared, tired, and confused state in its attempts to continue existence despite the lack of love it has found itself inflicted. I ate when I used, even when I wasn't hungry, and supplemented with tuna for omega 3 tablets to help restor order to my mind and help me come back from Meth- induced psychosis on the expectionally rare occasion when I misjudged the strength of the shit I was using.

It took me only one time to OD and barracade myself in the bathroom of a coffee house I found myself in, unintentionally, and overwhelmingly, feining severe and debilitating stomach cramps for five hours, all the while, face peering through the crack at the bottom of the door, watching for the booted feet of the police I was convinced were going to ambush me when I opened the door. After five hours, they told me they were gonna call me an ambulance and police if I wasn't getting any better. I ended up taking a leap of faith, but not before flushing the toilet a number of times (don't remember how many) giving me the opportunity to take me with my pants down on on the floor feining a suddenly realized head injury.

I found myself twacked out of reality twice during the time I used. The above experience was the last and scariest. I know I have used a little too much when I can no longer sense people entering the door when my back is turned to it. Rarely can someone get by me undetected. But I once used too much and I couldn't accurately trust this sense which has always served me reliably in the past. In this instance, fortunately, I was home, and became so convinced that my roommate was secretly harboring approximately 30 people in undisclosed places in our two room apartment that I found myself seeking litmus to my paranoia by inviting every single one of them to come out of hiding and mount my accessibly tempting and invitingly splayed. You can imagine my embarassment when my roommate found me, without tire, 5 hours later, still pulsing and inviting phantom visitors with the pulsing, nonstop vice like action of emaciating ass.

I expose to all of you this soft underbelly for which many will probably find themselves in judgement of me. To those people, I cordially invite you to fuck off. But, to those willing to consider non judgement in difficult and personal battles of obsessions to live in euphorias which many people will never find. This is a daily battle to accept harsh realities or escape to a place seemingly, yet falsely happy and secure.

Our world is difficult place to exist. And everyone, in some way seeks escape from the often harsh realities we are given when we attept to accept it on its own terms.

I hope this might hope germinate the seeds of understanding in for those dealing with addiction - a daily struggle - baffling, cunning, and always seeking to once again activataiting waiting as long as it must for ever and any moment of weakness - kept at bay by most addicts through a practicum of spiritual existence and rigorous honesty.

There are many people are constitutionally incapable of seeking and practicing a spiritual way of life, in surrender, love, acceptance, and perseverence in abstinence through even the most trying, crippling and hurting of human conditions. These people die. I implore your compassion and love for others, especially for those whom it may appear do not have a strength such as yours.

With all my truths, humilities, admissions, and the multitudes of unspoken and pains I thought might never find end, I've chosen to surrender to the lessons they yield. I gift my experience to you as a story do with as you will.

Thank you for your honesty. One of the traits of an addict is that they are fundamentally incapable of being honest with themselves.-joseph[/quote]

Joseph---almost 10 years ago I was sitting in the office of an alcohol and drug counselor for a court-ordered evaluation. The counselor asked me if I was being honest with her, and my response to her was, "I am being as honest as I can, which isn't very much." That epiphany changed my life. There is the old saying that you can tell when an addict lies because his lips are moving does have a basis in reality. Hey Guys! Our brains are built differently. That's not an excuse, but it is a fact. I will always have an addictive personality but I am learning to deal with it, though not always very successfully. Chasing guys like I was chasing a bag has been a huge impairment to being able to build healthy relationships and I don't think it is unrelated to my contracting hiv and hep. 12 stepping has helped me a lot as well as adopting the conventional wisdom of folks who are in solid recovery, all of which has been of the greatest benefit for me to learn to deal with being hiv. BTW one definition of addiction that really hits home is "self-will run riot." I will confess one thing I know for for certain---we addicts are not in any way, shape or form decent relationship material unless we are doing our own recovery work and I mean doing, because it never gets done.

Joseph... I think that ranks as the most eloquent and eye opening description of addiction I have ever read. I certainly hope that it was as cathartic for you to write as it was riveting for me to read.

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Floating through the void in the caress of two giant pink lobsters named Esmerelda and Keith.

I want to attempt to express the intrinsic and torturous emotional hunger of methamphetamines that sickeningly permeates the curious soul, all the while inviting the universal laws of existence to rip you apart by the smallest and most unknowing particles -joseph[/quote]

Wow! Joseph-----I've never read in words such a description of an addict's world looking from the inside like you've just written. I am honestly blown away. That overwhelming magnetic pull back into the maelstrom of euphoric pleasure is the cunning enemy we fight, and most of us with varying degrees of success. One thing that stands out to me from your writing is that addiction is a disease of the spirit, not just the mind and body, and whatever one's spiritual path it has to encounter a spiritual power of a magnitude to withstand and to overcome this enemy.

I'm confused. I thought strayboy said he just attended NA meetings out of some general interest, and not because of an addiction. Am I misreading something?

No. I don't consider myself an addict. You can call me one if you want. I honestly don't care. However, I stopped using drugs without the principles of NA and AA, way before I chose to include the solution seeking principles of the twelve step program in my life. I've always had life skills, and fears whick steered me into realizing the direction I would take this if unchecked. These steps have been amazingly helpful in helping me be break the isolation and alienation I was unwillingly subjecting myself to. Despite any Post Program Life Skills, I've ALWAYS been socially retarded beyond concepts fo help, and self-hating to boot. All in all, I belive in living the honesty and acceptance in my life, never allowing myself to forget less I stunt my own personal development, the unchangable and constant truth that everything in life is dynamic, and should be allowed to develop, despite any unnatral attempts I may find myself engaging in some feable and futile attempt to keep the world around me from that opportunity. In the end, it never works out. I truly believe that these principles are helping to make me a better person and adopting being acceptant and supportive human being to those who use them and a helpful guide through my own growth and my sharing of that with thsoe who don't. I also find myself not finding myself in frustration at the inability of those who are unwilling to seek answers beyond the limitations of what they have made work in their stunted little worlds. I have found that I am in rewarding and supportive friendships with people who strive to remain in the solutions, not tangling themselves in problems, This I find helps to keep me grounded and honest with myself when I become willfull and resistant to the pain in my truths.

I knew to stop before I reached the bottom. You see, addiction is like a downward moving elevator, and, you can get off on any floor that your self will, impulse control and self honesty will alert you too. The person truly suffering from hard core drugs addiction often drifts through life without any hint of these developed skills, variations or substitutions on them, often become so wrapped up the temporary escape of the realities around them that they are never alerted that there is anything except the bottom floor. Sometimes, the need for escape becomes so strong that they damage and contaminate any of those skills they have managed to develop, this person, too will often be unaware that they don't have to ride the elevator all the way down.

Thank you Strayboy....Joseph.... that was one of the most revealing and personal accounts of addiction I think I ever read. I am in awe of your skills to put it into words. I got off the addiction elevator with drugs around 1990. This was after about 5 years of mildly escalating cocaine use. ( But I had been doing soft core recreational drugs since 1965). What finally did it for me was having a cocaine dealer living literally across the street from me. I had the unfortunate front row seat as she slipped further and further into the abyss. She accused her neighbors of drilling holes into her house to steal marijuana. She had started out by selling MOSTLY to gay boys who were cool. They partied and were fun. (There were evenings when my former lover and I were included in all night coke fests.) They owned restaurants in Center City and had townhouses. They started dying of AIDS and when this happened her income suffered. Before the end came she had really scary dealers from Camden...the ones who carry guns and who shoot people....coming by at late hours. We used to find hundreds of crack vials on the street out in front of my house. She had to sell her house and I was relieved to say the least. I think I was scared enough to know I had to stop.

Joseph, That wonderful episode was difficult to read because it's heavily word-embellished (flowery) and i have attention spans of 10 second intervals. Thank you for sharing. I got through it and absorbed the important parts. Me thinks I will go back and tackle it again. The things we undergo in pursuit of euphoria, huh? What is amazing when you think about it is that we survived and prospered beyond.

Philly---I will let Strayboy speak for himself, but I can tell you that addiction is a progressive condition. I went to a few 12 step meetings and had friends in recovery prior to my ever facing my own addiction(s).

Something all addicts have in common is an existential loneliness and anxiety that drives our addiction and can be crippling at times. Without question this drove my "dont give a shit" attitude that accompanied my bare-backing days and ultimately led to my contracting both hiv and hep B. That and the euphoric high of raw sex and sex-seeking behavior.

I believe that the majority of gay men are sexual addicts----it is so easy to mask this addiction because so much of what really is addictive behavior has become the norm, and to hide behind the rationalization that "I just happen to be one of those guys with a strong sex drive who needs to get his rocks off more than most."

Rick----Ah! Joseph you did speak for yourself, and again eloquently so!

Rick, your analogy for some may be correct, but what about people like me that had more friends than they knew what to do with? Well employed and great money and wasn't depressed. Friends that didn't use meth. I myself just liked the high. If I would have paid more attention to my weight loss I wouldn't have got caught and if the person that caught me hadn't have been an ex-addict of meth then I know I wouldn't have got caught. It was a good thing for me that I did get confronted, because it saved my job and my career.

I knew to stop before I reached the bottom. You see, addiction is like a downward moving elevator, and, you can get off on any floor that your self will, impulse control and self honesty will alert you too. The person truly suffering from hard core drugs addiction often drifts through life without any hint of these developed skills, variations or substitutions on them, often become so wrapped up the temporary escape of the realities around them that they are never alerted that there is anything except the bottom floor. Sometimes, the need for escape becomes so strong that they damage and contaminate any of those skills they have managed to develop, this person, too will often be unaware that they don't have to ride the elevator all the way down.

Addicts live in their own personal hell. Their toxin(s) of choice are merely the vehicles they use to transport themselves to its deepest reaches.

Joseph- I am humbly moved by the word-illustrations you have employed to show us a piece of your soul. I hope that sleep will come soon, angel. and that on waking you find the demons less confrontational to your psyche.

With love,Brent

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Blessed with brains, talent and gorgeous tits.

The revolutionary smart set reads The Spin Cycle at least once every day.

I've never had any experience with crystal meth, but I think this thread had turned into more about addiction. I have had periods of binge drinking and constant marijuana use after my initial diagnosis in 1986. From my experience with addiction, it is less about a euphoric "high" and more about trying to fill an emotional void. For me, that kind of mental obliteration is more about a focused attempt to push yourself away from a toxic, but inevitable, problem that you will eventually HAVE to deal with, unless you die in the process.

I am the first to admit that I have pushed myself into extreme situations with or without drugs to try to sustain that intense "feeling" people get addicted to. My brain likes that "bombs bursting in air" feeling, when it happens in small doses. Yes, I think there are some people (including myself) who crave stimulation beyond the latest on Anna Nicole's burial or the latest episode of CSI. For the record, I've never watched that show but I'm sure it's worthy...don't want to step on any toes around here. And yes, I watch mindless TV at times and have been known to eat a whole bag or OREOS in one sitting. I think it's safe to say that I can relate to, on some level, self-destructive behavior, though not quite the kamikaze nose dive that meth addiction apparently entails.

I think it all goes back to dodging the inevitable white elephant that's hanging out in your head. Whatever it is! I think addiction is to depression like the chicken is to the egg. Which came first? I think the two are joined at the hip. At least, this is my experience with it. I do think that there is a huge difference between abuse and use too. That can be another post all together but I can enjoy a three beer buzz now and not have to drink a twelve pack and do shots. The same goes with other naturally occurring remedies for relaxation. I have just about confused myself with this whole issue of addiction, and perhaps, I don't understand that insatiable drive to block out reality and turn tricks like a crack hungry whore.

However, one thing is for sure. After reading the entries in this post, there is no doubt that any curiosity I may have had about trying this drug has been completely VAPORIZED! This has been a very valuable read.

Thanks to those who have offered their supportive words, and the judgement on this part my life that you've all so very thoughtfully kept to yourselves.

Fortunately for me, I would characterize my use (by most standards of addiction and compulsive urges not to mention my ability to keep my use within a planned budget) as experimentation. My drug use was restricted in growth by the mixed blessing of my deformed ability to cope with life. Ironically, it's this very thing, and escape from it that forces some into the world of addction.

My mother died when I was nine, leaving me with a forced coping and a forever crippling wound, exposing and paining me in a taunting depressive reminder that everything must end. This is something most people come to terms with late in life, having the benefit of experience through losses and lessons in life that allow the gradual progression of coping and working toward our own peace with the surrender of permanence.

Sadly, I am reminded, in my own obsessive and compulsive and strangely addicted way, that any joys, hapinesses or loves or feelings I should bear witness to will be forever fleeting - a moment I can only ever hope to remember. I am a prisoner of my own coping mechanisms which will forever prevent me from allow myself to enjoy living in the present. You see, I am constantly searching my memories for safe moments in my past, always hyper vigilant in my knowing the inevitability of end is the promise my future can hold.

I fear involving myself with others, giving them the false sense of security that I will forever and unendingly give of myself (this is the true passion of my life), only knowing deep inside that I can't promise them anything. I find myself in fear of intimacy and the inability extend myself emotionally to others. The very code of my genetics has mapped for me the promise of a shortened life, my own unexpected ending one capable of devastating anyone foolish enough to involve themselves as more than just an acquaintaince in my sickenend and cursed existence.

Even in discovering the euphoria through whic meth allowed my passage, before I even entertained the idea of an entombing darkness of withdrawal, I knew that a feeling so good could never be real, and that it too would have an ending. And I would yet again find myself in disappointment. This is my secret.

Sometimes I find comfort knowing that there is an end, grateful to the promise of release from daily living and the ability to surrender the pains of life.

I find myself in fear of intimacy and the inability extend myself emotionally to others.

Darling, sweet, hunk of a man...YOU ARE DOING JUST WHAT YOU SAID YOU COULDN'T!!!!!

I am so bewildered at times that you don't see it yourself. You have been such huge part of my recent growth process and in my acceptance of the fact that life continues to change with or without me. Thank you for putting yourself out there for the world to see. I've always known that you would someday be a supernova. (You are burning so bright I need glasses!)

OH MY GOSH!! It is such a huge problem here in the Tampa Bay, FL area. I do not and have not done anything like crystal. I tried pot and coke but didn't like them.

Louie got hooked big time! Started out small, snorting, led to smoking, led to shooting it up. He had promised me he would never do that until 1 day I saw him. I about lost it.

For awhile though I was in my own little Paxil world, no emotions, no sex drive so I let it go on. When it started to cost us a lot of money, he started selling. Up for days on end. We had a lot of orgies that went on for days at the house. I'd go to sleep, wake up the next morning to a whole new group of guys over.

It's amazing to see a butch top guy trying to perform on crystal. And even more amazing how many virgin tops that were willing to have me top them for the first time. Totally ruined a lot of things.

Louie ended up almost 4 years ago in the hospital with a staph infection in his hip, almost killed him. We lost our house after he was clean for over 6 months. Just couldn't afford meds for him and the house, part of the "Sale of a Lifetime" story that I didn't talk about.

He was in really rough shape. He's been clean and sober now since then. I told him it was either the drugs or me. It wasn't easy for him or any of us. I threatened our so called friends that if the came over stoned or with that shit I would call the cops on them. No one called or came around. I scared the hell out of them. GOOD!!

Louie learned the hard way and loves me even more for staying with him through all of the drug days. Though the sex was great back them, I always had a house full of horny bottoms just begging for me to give it to them anyway I wanted. After awhile thoug it got boring, they just would lay there buzzing and wanting more crystal.

Now Louie doesn't have a sex drive at all, so now I do without. Just about 4 years since I last had sex with another man.

Part of the price I've had to pay for being Mr. Nice Guy and sticking by the man I love, even through his drug habbit and now through his sobriety.

I want to take a moment for sharing your personal account of addiction. It has mademe realize that I cannot sit in judgement of any addict, as I have never walked in thatpair of shoes.

I think I can relate when you say that "any joys, hapinesses or loves or feelings I should bear witness to will be forever fleeting". I experienced this at an early age, whenmy mother took her own life when I was 12 years old. Somehow, I convinced myselffor too long that this was a valuable "lesson". I've come to discover, only recently, that I've been lieing to myself about that. What I really learned is how to alienate and isolate myself from others. And now, at 42, I'm trying to work to undo that -- whichseems like a daunting after 30 years of denial.

You say that you find in yourself an "inability extend myself emotionally to others." I'dhave to agree with Brooks' assessment below that you have done just that here. Anddone so far more (and far more eloquently) than I have ever done.

Regards,

Henry

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"Life in Lubbock, Texas, taught me two things: One is that God loves you and you're going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love." - Butch Hancock, Musician, The Flatlanders

Philly had some excellent points. Meth is easier to hide than other drugs sometimes. UGH.

I can't remember the exact first time I tried it. In fact, I believe it was a straight girlfriend who introduced me to it. We were coworkers and I absolutely loved the initial feelings of wow, I can take on the fucking world. We used to joke before work that we just didn't have time to make "coffee."

To be honest I can see how people become addicted. It sneaks up on ya. Some people go over the deep end quicker than others.

One thing which sounds ludicrous which I feel helps propel this drug to the top is "body image." Women are using it and gay men for sure. It's cheaper than coke and 15 times stronger from what I hear and know. If you want to loose a quick 10, 20, 30lbs just join the Jenny Crack Diet. Watch all your dreams come true and disintegrate overnight when your head is clear and you realized ya just fucked up your entire life.

For me, it was my best friend that destroyed his life. A couple others too. But, the one friend was enough for me to learn my lesson. I never touched that crap again.

You know I think most people are fairly good at hiding meth use at first. Other than my friends who were dealing to support their own habits I really didn't associate with the club crowd in that sense. I knew that'd be a disaster and just avoided it. Probably a good thing.

I've noticed since I moved to Austin less than 3 years ago the problem is out of control here. There used to be a club that catered to all the junkies. Unfortunately, that one is closed and now they are at every other club. Another reason to avoid bars ; )

Definitely, I can see why people use meth for a variety of reasons. Initially, it's fun. I thought it was like instant intimacy in the form of a cheap powder. It gives you a feeling of invisibility. Does something to your libido that makes sex seem out of this world.

Then, you realize you're not doing it for fun anymore. It's just a sick and pathetic addiction, and you gotta get more cause your crashing. Ugh! Never again!

I've noticed a high percentage of HIV+ guys seem to choose a path of self destruction. Meth is a surefire way to kill yourself. But hey why not have some fun doing it right?

Meth is popular for a lot of reasons, avoiding reality and escapism are a couple good ones, how many of us wouldn't like to do that?

Ive never been much into drugs or party drugs or even simple soft-drugs. So for a long time I have been oblivious to people using drugs around me. Some guy with drug use experience opened my eyes and showed me what people were doing in clubs and since then I am much more aware of drug-taking in clubs and bars. Luckily the whole crystal thing seems not to have caught on in Europe. Lets hope it never will. Cocaine is widely spread though and the other drug, which we all tend to forget, Alchohol which is a great inhibitor too. Apart from the immensely addictive en huge health-related problems that coincide with crystal do you think it is less dangerous for unsafe sex than people that had too much too drink??

The phone rings. Scooter opens his eyes slowly. The daylight through the closed curtain hurts his eyes. He thinks to himself "why won't that God Damn' phone just quit ringing?" He knows that it has to be another tweaker on the other end looking for a bag. "What day is this?" He wonders. His sinuses are dry, his head hurts. He looks around the room at the dirty ashtrays, syringes, spoons, and garbage. A butane torch sits on the nightstand. He reaches for it and searches the nightstand drawer for the glass pipe that makes him feel "normal." "Where the fuck is that bag?" he wonders. His hands - stained with iodine, and dried from sodium hydroxide and muriatic acid burns - fumble around until the treasure is found. His boss's 22 year old wife is laying next to him. He remembers his Boss finding her with him three days earlier. I Guess he won't be going to work today... "Oh well." He thinks to himself. The job was just a way to justify some sort of income... To hide his real carreer. And the sex was worth it. He wonders what day it is, and how long he's been sleeping. He lights the torch and takes a hit. Does he love this? Or does he hate it? He doesn't know. He thinks that it used to be "fun." But that was so long ago. He tries to block out all the uglyness and takes another hit. His teeth are rotting from the acidic HCl. He lays his head back down and stares at the celing, recalling the past four sleepless days. FUCK! he forgot to take his pillz... Again! The body next to him stirs and slowly comes to life. A bag whore; Beautiful, in a slutty kind of way. He hands her the pipe. She didn't have to ask... He knew. Now that she has awaken he isn't concerned about disturbing her. He sits up and reaches for the spoon. Then drops some of the sparkling white crystals onto it and draws up some water into a syringe with his other hand. He sprays the water into the spoon. He watches it bubble as he heats it with a Bic lighter. The phone rings again. He ignores it and draws the solution through a cigarette filter. This has become a routine that he no longer has to think about. He wraps some surgical tubing around his arm and clenches his fist. His favorie veins are all gone. He strugles now to find one. Holding the syringe vertical he tapps the bubbles to the top then pushes the plunger being careful not to waste his precious dope. Then he pushes the point into a vein and draws the plunger back until he sees blood.. He unwraps the surgical tubing and presses the plunger down. A rush goes through him. He can taste the diethyl ether that he used when he titrated the freebase. He can now face his miserable life - ignorant of the fact that this is the very cause of his missery. He's not in his own house. This is someone elses' house that he uses as his lab. He gets up and walks to the bathroom. A seven year old girl Is standing at the bathroom door with tears in her eyes. "Grandma," she says." I found a spoon in the bathroom." And she begins to uncontrolably cry. As fucked up as he is, he knows that this is something a child should not have to deal with. And his already dark soul turns black. He walks past her, closes the door and takes a piss. Then sits down and puts his head between his hands. "How did his life get so fucked up?" he wonders. "Where did it start?" And "When will it end." The last question lingers. He doesn't consider the control he has over his life - because he has no control. The drug has taken control. Instead, he considers just ending his life. *sigh* "Fuck it!" he says to himself. Then walks back into the dingy dirty room. "What's wrong?" The bag whore asks. "Nothing." He replys, then sits next to her on the bed. She passes the empty pipe back to him and he begins another day of what has become his life. And it only gets worse.

Do you think that this can't happen to you?

Scooter used to think that.

But Scooter has seen it happen to dozens of people.

It will start as a recreational drug. There will be a circle of people who you meet. None of them will care about you. Many of them will try to hurt you. Some will succeed.